


i said, "i got you now"

by liquidsky



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) Fusion, Dan's a mess, Falling In Love, M/M, Spider-Dan, Spider-Phil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-11 15:03:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19930024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liquidsky/pseuds/liquidsky
Summary: All it takes is a leap of faith. (Fine, and some tears.Maybea few bruises.Possiblyfalling in love with someone from another dimension. Nothing Dan can't handle, really.)





	i said, "i got you now"

**Author's Note:**

> _spider-man: into the spider-verse_ (2018) is up there on the good old _all-time favorites_ list, and i couldn't possibly be any happier that i got to write this. written for the phandom reverse bang with beta [phanandpenguins](phanandpenguins.tumblr.com) for phan-future's prompt and art. <3

“What the fuck,” Dan says, from where his bare skin is sticking to the wall after he’d accidentally slipped on his dirty underwear and nearly went flying face-first to the bathroom floor. 

Dan has a brief moment of panic in which he thinks someone must have pranked him – but it’s quickly followed by the memory that no one has acknowledged his existence at all in the three months he’s spent at Manchester University so far, which makes it very doubtful that anyone would have taken the time to apply fucking superglue to his left hand, of all places. He has the fleeting thought of having to visit the hospital and ask some poor fellow to _un_ stick his hand from his dick and is suddenly thankful that whatever the fuck was happening now at least had the mercy of happening post-shower. His gratitude lasts all of five seconds, though, before he yelps in pain. Dan’s hand, for reasons unbeknownst to him, just won’t budge. 

“What the fuck.” He repeats, quiet enough that it barely sounds like more than a breath. He tries again, and nothing happens. 

Dan sighs. He would say this is not how he’d imagined his morning going, but to be fair he hadn’t imagined much at all once he woke up from his weird post-panic-attack less-than-ideal sleep. He’s tired, and grumpy, and maybe feeling a little bit like his soul has wholly left the premises, and he’s also apparently _stuck to a wall._

The whole endeavor feels like just enough of a clusterfuck to fit right into his life, so keeps trying. He tries, and tries, and tries some more. When he looks up to meet his own eyes in the mirror it’s to find that not only is he stuck to the wall, he also has a _huge,_ particularly nasty-looking pus-filled swelling in the crease of his left shoulder, and what in the _fuck_ is going on. 

He squints at his own reflection, lips pursed. It looks like an insect bite. It looks _gross,_ too, but the pressing matter is that it looks like an insect bite, and he doesn’t recall getting bitten by any insects, even though obviously he must have been. Dan doesn’t feel like he’s about to drop dead – he feels weirdly healthy, actually, despite the exhaustion and the depression and the general heaviness of the curse of being _him._

Dan, who’s a sad sack of a Law student by day and just enough of a crime show aficionado by night to know that what he needs to do is embark on the journey of reviewing his entire day the day before with hopefully only a small amount of existential mortification, sighs. Again. It’s not like he has anyone he could call, he thinks, and his cellphone is somewhere trapped under the mess he’s sure to have made of his bedsheets even if he _did_ have someone, so instead all he can really do is sigh. 

For the sake of honesty (which Dan absolutely fucking despises, thank you very much), he should probably admit to himself that he doesn’t need to review anything for too long to realize that the likelihood of him getting bitten by what can only have been a demon spider in his perfectly clean Obligations I classroom is low. Which pretty much solves the puzzle, and he can only cringe to himself as he remembers his own lack of self-control the day previous, jogging out of the room with his breath caught in his throat to hide in the last stall of the shitty bathroom on the last floor, the one he knows no one ever uses because it constantly smells of shit and dust. It’s a pretty gross bathroom, which makes it the perfect place for hiding away from the world and gasping against the fabric of his sweatpants as he sits on the floor with his head against his knees. Not that that happens often. It doesn’t. It might depend on who you’d ask about the precise definition of often, but Dan would gladly argue that three-times-a-week-tops isn’t it. 

So, fine. He probably was bitten by a demon spider while struggling to breathe in the world’s smelliest (literal) shithole, and if _that_ doesn’t paint the perfect fucking picture of his life Dan doesn’t know what does. 

Maybe the only upside of being painfully lonely is that at least no one’s here to witness his demise, as he figures he’s probably a few hours from having to break his mirror and use it to saw off his own arm. That somehow seems preferable to having to scream for help and be found buck naked in his dorm bathroom just a few feet from a literal _pile_ of all his dirty laundry and some old pizza that he’s sure has turned radioactive by now. 

With a grunt, Dan leans against the wall, wrist twisting awkwardly. He should probably try to relax.

“Breathe,” Dan tells himself, the crisp lilt of his accent fading to mimic the voice of his favorite ASMR vlogger. “Just breathe.”

It doesn’t quite work. He closes his eyes, deciding to try to conjure some images of things that usually make him at least kind of happy. He thinks of candles, but instead of the woodsy scent of his favorite one, his mind twists and loops around the words _fire hazard._ He thinks of the lyrics to Rosalía’s latest single and his shoulders tense remembering that he’d promised himself he’d take Spanish classes in the summer and the mere thought of failing at something again has his stomach tightening terribly. He even tries to think of porn – _bad_ idea, as it takes him straight to his usual crisis. He thinks of wide shoulders and defined biceps and his heart speeds up in a way that makes him feel both sweaty and uncomfortable. 

He shifts uneasily against the wall. 

Finally, after just about an entire lifetime, he manages to focus on something that doesn’t make him want to crawl right out of his skin. The familiar instrumental builds from his tongue to the tips of his fingers, and he feels it as the tension leaks out of him, leaving his body to slump back against the tiles. Each note curls around him easily until he’s calm, heart slowing its pace. 

He takes a careful step forward, and his hand follows the rest of him. He grins, lifting his palm to inspect it with curious eyes. 

It doesn’t look any different. He’s not sure what exactly he expected, but the lack of any sign that could explain why the fuck he just spent ten minutes glued to his bathroom wall makes him clench his jaw in annoyance. 

Dan looks up. It seems highly unlikely that the rotten-looking swelling on his shoulder would just disappear, but even as he squints at his own reflection he can’t see much of anything. It would be just his luck to start going crazy _now_ , wouldn’t it? Not as though he doesn’t have enough problems to spare. He lifts his hands again, touching the pads of his fingers to his palm. They feel weird, kind of, but he can’t for the life of him figure out _how._

Outside the bathroom, his alarm starts chiming loud enough to wake the dead, so he scrambles naked out to his room, somehow managing not to stick himself to anything on the way. 

–

His day goes weirdly, to say the least. 

He’s sweaty all the way down to his balls pretty much all day, and he’s _pretty sure_ he didn’t use to be able to hear so much of his classmates’ talking, and the one time he bumps into the stall in the main bathroom it completely falls off (he runs for the hills, pretending to be avidly interested in the whole lot of _nothing_ that’s happening outside the window as three upperclassmen announce to everyone on the corridor that someone must’ve gotten into a nasty fight). 

– 

Dan sweats through the night, body overheated and shaky as he tosses and turns, sticking grossly to the sheets. He doesn’t fall asleep, though his mind grows too foggy for him to feel anything resembling conscious. 

– 

He’s exhausted the next day, stumbling to and from classes in a feverish haze he can’t seem to break out of. 

– 

It lasts for three days. Three days of sweating his soul out, walking around blearily on very little sleep, his entire body feeling decidedly odd in the most upsetting of ways, either too hot or too cold, skin prickling as though his blood is made entirely of ants and hairs standing up if anyone as much as glances in his general direction. It’s there, all the time, every second, a feeling so strange he couldn’t name it if he tried. It’s there until one morning it isn’t. 

– 

Dan does what he does best: he adapts. He also spends a whole day crying for no identifiable reason once his body decides it’s going to allow him to exist out of the weird bubble he’d spent the last few days in, but all in all it’s fair to say he adapts. It takes him about an hour to figure out that something’s different – he sticks to the wall again, but only for a few seconds, and he openly gapes at the viscous web that trails from the wall to his wrist after he pulls his hand free. 

So he has – abilities. Powers, maybe. It’s both the most and least surprising thing that could ever happen to him, he thinks, staring at the funky-looking hole in his wrists. They look absolutely fucking gross, and Dan tries shooting out of them by doing any and all imaginable moves to no success until it _works_ and he accidentally pulls his laptop to him and ends up whacking himself on the head with it. 

He throws the laptop down on the bed and is about to rub his head when he realizes that it barely hurt at all. 

“Holy fuck,” Dan breathes out, eyes wide as saucers. Even his voice sounds different, he thinks. 

He feels – he doesn’t know _how_ feels, honestly. Scared, and thrilled, and also weirdly vindicated because he’s spent at least half his life being treated by the entirety of the universe like someone who’s carrying the fucking plague or something, but for once being the underdog seems to have paid off. It’s not – he can’t think of it as a curse, not yet, and that of itself is surprising enough to have him reeling, as he _specifically_ thinks all things are a curse. 

But not today, not when he can apparently have _webs shoot out of his body._ Which is something he vows to never, ever say out loud. And so, armed with two holes, a whole lot of stupidity and a remarkable lack of self-restraint, Dan climbs up to the top of the building (he breaks the door lock with his bare hands, which is equally incredible and terrifying) and stands right at its very edge. He’s seen movies. He’s seen plenty of movies, and he has _powers_ now. He can probably fly.

Dan takes a deep breath. He can _fly._

He jumps. 

– 

He falls.

Dan bounces off the grass like a fucking jumping ball, letting out a yelp followed by a grunt followed by a quiet “What the fuck.” 

At least he’s alone, he finds, glancing around the patio to meet the eyes of a grey pigeon that is staring at him looking _far_ too judgemental. His body aches as he struggles to sit up, an odd echo of pain that resonates from the tips of his toes up to his nose. It hurts, but he’s _alive_ even though he literally just jumped out a seven-storey building a minute ago, so Dan’s definitely counting that as a win. He can’t fly. It’s fine, he can probably work around it. 

Work around it for _what_ he doesn’t know, but he reckons he’ll figure it out soon enough. There are things you can do with superpowers, he thinks, maybe drop out of University and become a bounty hunter? Is that a thing? Dan tries not to linger on the fact that he’s constantly thinking about dropping out of University to do weird shit and that now he’s apparently got the perfect enabler. 

What he needs, Dan thinks, is to get it together. He’s going to be a lawyer. He won’t be dropping out of school. He’s going to be a lawyer with superpowers and he’s hopefully going to stop crying himself to sleep every night. And maybe quit running out of class to hide in the bathroom. It’s highly unlikely that courage comes along with the superpowers as a great 2-for-1 package deal, but he _did_ just leap out of a building, so who knows. Dan suspects that might have had more to do with the general state of his mental well-being than with any sort of bravery, but it’s not like he’s got anyone to talk to about this theory of his. 

Dan sighs, standing up from the floor and dusting off his pants and jumper. He’s got powers to figure out.

– 

As it turns out, he can't fly, but he can lift seriously heavy stuff, run obnoxiously fast and heal from a life-threatening fall in less than 10 minutes, not to mention he hasn't bumped into a _single_ corner since this whole thing began, and last night he ate a total of fifteen vegetarian burritos from the cafeteria without bloating or feeling at all full.

So he's been doing good. He's even been training, if training means that he's skipped class four days in a row and didn't get up once, using his web to reach for pretty much everything. He _did_ knock over four cups of coffee all over his study notes and most of the socks he'd left spread over the desk, but his aim is pretty good now.

Anyway, he's fine. Better than he'd expected, giving the potential life-changing character of _having superpowers._ He's not the best with change, but (unbelievably) he's taken this particular one in stride. 

He's hanging upside down from the ceiling and bopping his head to _What The Fuck Right Now_ when he feels the first signs of the tingle settle in his stomach. Goosebumps rise on his skin, and less than a minute later a shadow moves outside his window. 

He plops down to the floor, shoulders tensing as he removes his earplugs. The silence feels pretty ominous, and he takes a step forward almost on instinct before pausing, glancing at the empty space beside him. 

There's no one around. It's probably nothing, he thinks, but his body clearly doesn't agree if the cold spreading upwards and downwards from the pit of his stomach is anything to go by. 

"Is anyone–" Dan starts, voice coming out strangled. "Is anyone out there?"

No answer. He feels a prickle at the back of his neck and whips around to stare at his dorm room door. He doesn't find anything. He doesn't need to strain to hear the faint sounds of human activity across the hall from him, fellow students going about their lives at a non-remarkable pace even as he feels that something is decidedly _off._

Dan sees movement behind him and shifts, body acting purely on reflex, crouching down and twisting just as a hand attempts to clutch at his shoulder. 

With a kick far too swift to have come from him, he trips whoever tried to grab him and immediately jumps over them, knees pressing down against a soft stomach. 

Blue eyes peer up at him.

Dan frowns. "Who the fuck are you?" 

The guy, oddly bright-eyed and flushed under the dim light of Dan's dorm, stares back at him with a curious look. 

"I should ask you the same thing." The guy says, and Dan right away calls bullshit because _no_ , he absolutely fucking shouldn't. 

"In case it's escaped your notice, _you're_ in _my_ room." 

The guy smiles, tongue poking out between his teeth. "Am I?" 

Dan pushes his knee down, and the guy gasps. "I'll ask again. Who are you?" 

Full disclosure: Dan's bravado is entirely fake, and he's pretty sure he's about to shit his pants in the light of what is very clearly a home invasion nightmare, regardless of the fact that the guy squirming under him is wildly attractive and kind of harmless-looking. But no one needs to know that. Any of that, actually – not about his brave act and _definitely_ not about the way the guy's flushed cheeks and warm body feels almost unspeakably nice under his own. It's a mess. Dan's life is a mess. He's probably the only person on earth who'd have the hots for the unknown weirdo who broke into his dorm. 

The guy shifts quietly, eyes traveling briefly down to Dan's lips before looking back up to meet his eyes. "I'm Phil." 

" _Right._ " Dan says. "And why are you here, Phil?" 

Phil sighs, body relaxing under Dan's. "I've been looking for you." 

"Why?" Dan asks. 

As a rule, people don't _look_ for him. Especially not people who look like Phil – Dan glances down at Phil's chest only to end up meeting the eye of the tiny Pikachu illustration on his bright blue t-shirt. 

Phil's watching him with amusement when he looks back up. "Your powers."

"My what?" Dan says, just because he's pretty sure people who have superpowers aren't allowed to tell anyone else they have them. 

Phil squints. "Your powers? Spider powers? You were _just_ hanging from the ceiling." 

"Oh. Those." Dan blinks. "How do you know about them?" 

Phil watches him for a second, eyes narrowed. "Can I trust you?"

"I don't know, mate. You burst into my dorm room in the middle of the night for some reason, can _I_ trust _you_?"

"You have a point." Phil tells him. "Could you let me up? It's kind of-awkward, like this." 

Dan's pretty sure bringing attention to an awkward situation is just poor etiquette, but Phil has a point. It _is_ awkward, and maybe not just because Dan's starting to hyperventilate from the warmth of where his hands are wrapped around each of Phil's wrists. 

"Sorry." Dan says, maneuvering off of Phil and sitting back on his heels. 

Phil sits up too, a funny little crease to his brow as he moves to zip up his jumper. 

"So, your powers. I have them too." 

Dan's eyes go wide. "You do?"

With a grin, Phil lifts his hand – a large strand of webbing sticks to one of Dan's pillows, which Phil hugs close to his body the second it comes flying to him. 

"Shit." Dan says. "How long have you have them?"

"About five years, give or take." 

Dan nods. "How did you get them?" 

"Accidentally locked myself in a lab, got bitten by a genetically modified spider and experimented on by some scientists. The usual, uh, usual fanfare."

"The-what? That's not _usual._ " Dan gapes at him. "You got experimented on? What the fuck?" 

Phil shrugs. "It's not-it was fine. Or, I mean, it wasn't fine, but it happened, I'm good now. Anyhow-"

"How did they-what?"

Phil sighs. "Dan."

"Sorry, it's probably pretty insensitive to just-" 

"It's fine." Phil interrupts. "But it doesn't matter now, and there are things that do, so it's probably better if we get to them sooner rather than later."

Dan stops. The whole thing is a lot, if he's being honest, down from the way the light catches on Phil's multicolored eyes and makes him look slightly otherworldly up to the way Phil's frowning in concentration as he looks at Dan. 

"Listen. This is probably going to sound crazy, but I really need your help, so if you could just-"

Dan sighs. "Okay, I'll listen. And you sound… I don't know, you sound trustworthy enough, I guess, so."

"Thanks." Phil grins at him. "I'm, uh. Okay, how do I start this?" 

"At the beginning, hopefully." 

"Yeah." He nods, more to himself than to Dan. "A few days ago I faced-off against a–uh–an _extraterrestrial_ being, I guess you could call it, but he got away before I could really stop him. I kept looking for him, but I didn't find anything at all until yesterday." 

Dan stares at him. "You're fucking with me." 

"I'm really not," says Phil. 

"An _extraterrestrial being_?" Dan asks. He's pretty sure he's heard it correctly, and maybe he's got no high horse to speak of given his current situation, but the whole thing doesn't sound any less preposterous, even with his renewed perspective. 

Phil nods. "Exactly." 

"Okay." Dan exhales. "So yesterday?" 

"I found a portal. And I, uhm. I might have _accidentally_ slipped and–"

"You fell through the portal." Dan stares. 

Phil sighs. "I fell through the portal." 

"Where did it lead?"

Phil peers at him with brows quirked in a way that makes it absolutely clear to Dan that he thinks Dan's an idiot, so Dan frowns.

"Here." Phil tells him. "It led me here." 

"To my dorm room?" 

"To this dimension."

Dan squints at him. "Just so you know, it kinda sounds like you're telling me you're from _another dimension._ "

"That would be because I _am_ telling you I'm from another dimension. The one where I'm Spider-Man, though I guess that's your job here." 

"I don't have a job." Dan replies, which sounds fucking sad as he says it out loud, so he adds on, "I mean-I'm not Spider-Man or whatever." 

Phil looks confused. "You're not Spider-Man."

"No."

"But-you have. The powers? I just saw you hanging from the ceiling, I've been watching you for a few hours, how can you not be Spider-Man?" 

"I'm just not, mate." It pains Dan to say this, especially because he's pretty sure Phil's jumping ship the second he realizes Dan's nothing but a lazy bastard who's been using his powers to gorge on too much coffee and chocolate. "You've got the wrong person." 

"No, I don't." Phil tells him, voice weirdly confident for someone who was asking Dan whether he could trust him just a few minutes ago. 

"Listen," Dan starts, "I know you came a long way or whatever, but I'm not who you're looking for, trust me."

Dan's heart clenches weirdly in his chest at the look on Phil's face. For one, he doesn’t blink once while watching Dan. Then there's the fact that he looks almost _sad_ , with lips curved slightly downwards and his eyes almost glass-like. Dan squirms. 

"Even if you're not who I'm looking for yet, I reckon it's only a matter of time."

The exact inflection of Phil's voice makes chills rise on Dan's skin, and he can feel heat crawling up his cheeks. He looks away from Phil – Dan can't remember the last time anyone's expressed this much faith in him. 

"Didn't think you'd have time." Dan comments, praying to whatever deity is out there that he doesn't sound as choked up as he feels. 

Phil offers him a grin. "Well, technically we don't, but we have each other now, so maybe we won't need it." 

– 

Phil's sprawled across Dan's single bed looking far too comfortable while Dan lies on the floor with his feet propped up against the wall. Dan's putting a shit ton of effort into not staring obsessively at Phil, whose arms are pale and defined and _distracting_ now that he's shrugged off his jumper. 

Phil's telling him about his world, which Dan would've thought to be pretty low on their list of priorities, but apparently not. Dan finds that he enjoys the sound of Phil's voice. His accent is thick, words often slurring together on his northern drawl, and Dan has started to think maybe their universes aren't that different from one another, except–

"You don't have Muse in your world." Dan repeats, eyes going wide. 

Phil looks amused by the dramatic tone Dan's voice has taken. "Never heard of it."

"Holy shit."

"What?" Phil says, the word accompanied by a soft giggle. "Are they your favorite?" 

Dan peers at him. " _Obviously._ " 

"Okay," says Phil, not bothering to sit up before he shoots one of his webs in the direction of Dan's laptop, pulling it to his own lap so he can open it. "Let's hear it then. What's your password?" 

Dan scoffs. "I'm not giving you my password." 

"Please?" Phil asks. 

It's _one_ word, but Dan feels his resolve weaken all the same. He didn't use to be this much of a sucker, he swears.

"Don't laugh. It's I Love Nick Jonas, all lower case."

Phil raises his eyebrows. "Is that your boyfriend?"

Dan splutters for all of the ten seconds it takes him to realize Phil's smirking at him.

He scowls. "You're a shit."

"We have the Jonas Brothers too." Phil laughs, typing in Dan's password with ease. 

"What song should we start with?"

" _Uprising,_ probably." 

" _Uprising_ it is." Phil says, eyes lighting up when the first notes echo through Dan's dorm room. "Oh my god."

Dan grins at him. "I _know._ " 

It's one of those moments—small but just sharp enough that Dan feels his heart speeding up, palms tingling, a smile threatening to take over his features. He's happy, overwhelmingly happy as he watches Phil shut his eyes and start moving his head to the beat of the song. 

Dan has a second-long impulse to reach out, which is – inappropriate. He shouldn't. It's not something he should want, he's fought this little seed growing inside him every second of every day for the past 18 years, and he can't give in just yet. 

"Get up." Phil says, breaking the spell that had fallen over them as the first minutes of the song played out of the speakers on Dan's laptop. 

Dan tilts his head. "What for?" 

"We're training, this song seems like a good background." 

Dan stares up at him in disbelief. "We're… training?" 

"I need your help, remember?" says Phil. "Time for you to become Spider-Man."

– 

Becoming Spider-Man, Dan realizes, apparently involves a lot more pain than he'd originally expected. 

"You were supposed to _dodge,_ " Phil says, after hitting Dan in the face for about the hundredth time. 

They've been training for at least two hours – the first of which Phil spent painstakingly explaining the in-and-outs of their powers after he'd tried getting Dan to spar with him and Dan had very pointedly replied "No fucking way I'm doing that." 

Dan knew the basics already: his very disorganized mental catalogue of cans and can'ts was laid out for Phil in obnoxious detail, and it was _fine,_ if not particularly helpful. Phil had frowned at him a little before filling in the rest of the blanks, his hands wildly gesticulating and nearly smacking Dan across the shoulder as he talked. 

The second of the hours consisted of Phil forcing Dan to fight him, arguing that his Spider-Sense (or _tingles,_ as Dan had described it) would allow him to pick up fighting skills almost instinctively. 

Needless to say, as Dan glares at Phil with a hand clutching his cheek, that it hadn’t.

“If you hit me again–” Dan threatens, though the effect of his words might as well be non-existent with the giddy grin Phil’s sporting, sheepish but still obviously amused. 

“You _could_ stop me.” Phil tells him. 

Dan scowls. “I already would have if I could. Do you think I’m letting you hit me for _fun_?”

“Maybe that’s your thing, who knows.” Phil shrugs, hopping from one foot to the other and shaking his hands as though he’s getting ready to lunge for Dan again. 

‘It’s not–I don’t _have_ a thing.” Dan glares, taking a step back just as Phil takes one forward. 

Phil smirks. “Everyone has a thing.”

“I don’t,” Dan argues, then narrows his eyes. “What’s yours?”

“Maybe if you get a hit in I’ll tell you.” Phil offers. “Or just–if you dodge in time at least once I’ll tell you. Getting desperate here.”

Dan sighs, taking another step back. “You know what? For someone who’s apparently a hero you sure are a bit of an asshole.”

Phil lets out a bright giggle just as Dan finishes his sentence, which is honestly revolting if you ask Dan. He’s–Dan wants to smack himself in the face. Phil’s cute, with his high-pitched giggling and his tongue between his teeth, and the way he looks pleased even as Dan throws jabs at him. He’s sort of out of this world. 

“Comes with the job,” Phil tells him, lowering his voice like he’s telling Dan a secret. “Being a hero will leave you pretty jaded.”

Dan rolls his eyes. “Yeah, your giggling sounds pretty fucking jaded alright.”

“Giggling?” Phil pauses. “I don’t–I’m not _giggling._ ”

“You’re _absolutely_ giggling, Phil.” Dan tells him, smiling at the outraged look that flits over Phil’s features. “But don’t worry, I’m thinking that might be my thing.”

Phil’s eyebrows fly up to his hairline, and Dan flushes, cheeks heating up in what he knows is a pretty fucking obvious way. Phil’s wide-eyed surprised is swiftly exchanged for a small smile, which Dan wholeheartedly ignores, glancing away from Phil and biting his lip.

“So, uh–” Phil starts, and Dan looks up at the ceiling at the laughter laced through Phil’s words. “Dodging?”

“Sure.” Dan says, but he ends up tripping backwards as Phil moves forward into his space, held upwards by a web that Phil shoots straight to his chest. Dan’s body follows Phil’s as Phil takes some steps back, and Dan doesn’t try to fight it. 

Phil tugs slightly, and Dan shuffles closer to him easily before planting his feet. Phil breaks the webbing, looking far too pleased with himself. 

Dan rubs a hand over his face. “Isn’t there something else you could teach me?”

“Do you already know how to swing?” Phil asks him.

Dan doesn’t. Phil drags him all the way up to the top of the building Dan had jumped from. He stands next to Dan on the edge, a lot closer than Dan thinks is necessary, his shoulders brushing Dan’s whenever he moves. Dan’s fingers feel magnetized, as though he’s got electric currents traveling up his arm – his hand brushes against Phil’s exactly once, and he feels nearly lightheaded, exhaling around the wish to move closer to him. 

He doesn’t know what the fuck is happening, honestly. Whatever simmering brightness keeps building in the pit of his stomach is unknown and new and overwhelming and he doesn’t _like_ it, except for how he thinks he doesn’t ever want it to stop. He glances at Phil through the corner of his eye only to find that Phil’s already looking at him.

Phil clears his throat. “Do you see the trees?”

Dan nods, following the stretch of Phil’s arm to peer at the line of trees surrounding the patio. 

“You have to shoot for the branches. The highest ones, it’ll stick, then you jump. Fold your legs, knees up, pay attention so you know which trees to aim for. I’ll go first to demonstrate, all you have to do for now is not take your eyes off of me, okay?”

Dan nods again, not really feeling like sharing that he hasn’t really taken his eyes off of Phil since the second he broke into his room. It’s gotten to the point in which Dan is not sure he could even if he tried – Dan’s gaze keeps being dragged to Phil, a gravitational pull, and he hasn’t glanced at him once without finding Phil’s eyes already on him. 

“I’ll pay attention.” Dan assures him, then it’s Phil’s turn to nod. 

He leaps out with a kind of confidence that makes Dan choke around his next breath. Arms shooting out, Phil falls in a near perfect arc before following it to its completion and shooting his arms out again. And again. It’s oddly hypnotizing, the rise and fall of his body under the moonlight. Dan watches carefully because he can’t not to, feeling an unfamiliar tugging on his heart. He presses his palms to the side of his legs, inhaling sharply as Phil does a somersault, twisting his body in one fluid motion so he can start swinging in the opposite direction, making his way back to Dan. 

Dan tries not to stare as Phil lands deftly next to him on the edge, flushed cheeks and windswept hair. He looks happy.

“Did you get it?” Phil asks, nudging Dan’s foot with his own. 

Dan glances down at their feet before looking back at Phil’s face. 

“I think so.” Dan tells him. “You’re not allowed to laugh if I fall, though.”

Phil snorts, obviously lying through his teeth as he crosses his fingers over his heart. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

Dan doubts his leap looks anywhere near as impressive as Phil’s, but it does feel pretty great. He focuses on the tree he’s aiming for and yelps as he realizes that it _works_. He feels a little bit like an overcooked noodle as he swings from one tree to another, body sprawling awkwardly through the air. 

He lands less than greatly next to Phil, stumbling a little before he manages to right himself and shoot Phil a wide grin. 

Phil’s eyes look particularly bright as he smiles at Dan. “That was great!”

“Was it?” Dan asks, squinting at Phil. He appreciates the sentiment, but he’s pretty sure that though it might have been tremendously _fun_ , it wasn’t quite superhero level acrobatics. 

“I mean,” Phil starts, snorting quietly. “At least we know there’s room for improvement!”

Dan pushes him, unable to keep from smiling at Phil’s laughter.

– 

They train for three days. Phil is as good a teacher as Dan’s ever had – he’s distracting, too, everytime the sun catches his face Dan feels a little bit like he’s going to faint, blood rushing to his head too fast for his body to follow. He skips class, and skips more class, and ignores his assignments, and pretends he doesn’t have a single care in the world other than following Phil’s lead and mirroring his movements, breath hitching whenever Phil places his hands on Dan to steer him in the right direction. 

It’s the happiest Dan’s ever been, probably. There’s something to be said about the easy companionship that instills itself over them, even at night, as Phil lies mere centimeters away from Dan in the shitty thin mat they bought at Walgreens and blabbers on about his universe, the increasingly familiar shape of his accent light in the air around them. Dan presses his eyes closed and tries to memorize the exact drawl of Phil’s voice for when he’s gone. 

They train, and they investigate, and then they train some more. Dan’s getting – maybe not _good_ yet, but he’s getting better, heart unexpectedly full each time he nails a landing. Phil’s excited screech the first time Dan manages a somersault is about the worst thing Dan’s ever heard in his entire fucking life, and he wants to keep hearing it forever. 

He won’t. He _knows_ that, that regular life is waiting just around the corner and drawing closer with each passing day. They’re getting closer, too, to Phil’s _extraterrestrial_ being whose plan is still mostly unknown to them but nonetheless in dire need of getting cut short. 

Dan holds on to the warmth of Phil’s fingers curving around his wrist, to the sharp way Phil’s eyes follow Dan around the room. He’s never had this before – the novelty of being on the receiving end of such fond glances. It’s intoxicating and electrifying and leaves him just about reckless enough to lean into Phil’s space more times than he should, his hands brushing deliberately against Phil’s as they circle each other like a moon to a planet. 

Dan’s busy deleting all University-related emails from his account when Phil bursts into the room, obviously disgruntled. He presses himself against the door, breathing hard. 

“What–” Dan starts, but Phil shuffles forward just as he’s about to keep speaking, shutting Dan up completely by pulling off his shirt and leaning down to ruffle through the bag he bought along with the mat four days ago. 

“I found him.” Phil tells him. “Are you–do you think you’re ready?” 

Dan blinks at him. “Am I–what? What do you mean you found him? Where?”

“Remember we thought he’d be hiding near the portal, somewhere close to where I found him, but then I thought–” Phil stops for breath, and Dan would love to drag his eyes away from the smattering of freckles across Phil’s chest, but he– “That wouldn’t make sense, right, too easy, but I found him the first time by cross-checking the information about his specific heat signature to data on the last people to have interacted with the kind of the non-earthly matter that a being like that would’ve left–”

“So you’ve found him.” Dan interrupts, because Phil’s started pulling down his pants as he speaks and Dan’s frankly not equipped to dealing with both this overwhelming amount of weirdly scientific details and the equally overwhelming outline of Phil’s dick that can be seen through his light blue boxers. 

Phil grins to himself as Dan’s eyes snap back to his face. “I found him.”

“Great.” Dan tells him. “Now what?” 

Phil pulls a red and black _something_ out of the bag and throws it at Dan. “Put this on.”

Dan watches dazedly as Phil takes another one out of the bag and starts pulling it up his body. He looks – Dan’s mouth falls open despite himself, and he can most _definitely_ feel it as his blood tries to decide which extremity to rush to. 

“Dan,” Phil snaps, “Come on.”

Dan’s haze is at least partially broken by the fact that Phil’s wearing _spandex_ , which must mean– “I’m _not_ wearing spanx.”

“Why the fuck not?” Phil asks him, adjusting the fabric over his crotch in a way that Dan’s pretty sure is about to give him heart failure. “Hurry up, we need to go.”

“I’m not–It’s gonna look fucking terrible, are you kidding me?” 

Phil gives him a look. “It’s you. It’s not going to look bad.”

“Oh my god.” Dan mutters. “Can’t I just–why this?”

“It’s stretchy!”

“It’s awful.”

“It’s safe!”

“I–” He’s thought process is suitably interrupted by Phil’s glare. “Fine, I’ll wear the fucking spandex.”

“ _Thank you,_ ” says Phil. 

He keeps staring expectantly at Dan until Dan clears his throat, gesturing with his shoulders at Phil until he turns around, a faint blush on his cheeks. The spandex goes up unexpectedly easy (full disclosure: Dan was more than ready for a struggle). It’s warm, and a bit tight, but not as uncomfortable as he thought it would be. 

It’s very obviously _a superhero costume_ , though, and Dan would’ve expected it to feel ridiculous, to strike him as if he was a dumb kid playing dress up, but somehow it doesn’t. Instead, what he feels is a light sense of freedom seeping through him, as though he could be anything, could be anyone at all, not someone who’s afraid of letting go, afraid of who he is and who he likes and too scared of being known by other people. He runs his palms down his chest, feeling the spider symbol stitched onto the front of the uniform. Like this, he’s unknowable. It’s a giddy thrill – he’s whatever he wants to be, and he gets to choose who knows about it. 

He looks up, something bright curling around him. The first thing he sees is the stretch of material across the wide planes of Phil’s back, and he can’t exactly _not_ follow the definition down to Phil’s– 

“Are you done?” Phil’s gentle question drags him out of his reverie, and for about the millionth time tonight, Dan feels himself flush. 

“Yeah, I’m– all done.” 

Dan has a split-second urge to throw himself out the window in a haste in the fraction of time it takes Phil to turn around. He’s all too aware of how the uniform fits Phil. Dan can’t exactly resist giving in to at least one of the many versions taking space in his mind of how the uniform must fit _him_.

Phil does turn around, though, and Dan’s so very glad he didn’t just leap out of the room. The look on his face might as well be the single best thing Dan’s ever laid eyes on—his mouth is open just enough to make him look stricken, a flush starting from his cheek all the way down to his neck. 

He swallows, and Dan’s pretty sure he’s about to either drop dead or burst into flames. 

“You, uh.” Phil says, voice funny. “You look very. It looks, I mean, you--the suit, it. You.”

“Thanks,” Dan says. “You too.”

Phil nods, looking like he’s on the verge of a breakdown at his own spluttering. 

Dan clears his throat. “So, how do we–” 

“We go to him.” Phil tells him. “Capture him, find out how to close the portal.”

“And then you leave.” Dan says, though he knows that’s more of an end result than it is part of the plan. 

Phil nods, looking anything but happy about it. “And then I leave.” 

–

The plan they come up with is simple: find the alien, divide so they can each attack from one side, capture him, question him (Phil’s good cop, Dan’s bad cop, a decision they arrived to very easily), call it a day. 

Its simplicity might be the sole reason why it hasn’t gone to shit just yet. They’re kneeling each behind a pillar, watching as Phil’s alien messes with a futuristic-looking machine that may or may not be giving Dan the heebie jeebies, and Dan’s waiting for Phil’s lead so they can move in on the (for the world’s loosest definition of the word) guy. 

Phil, across from Dan and still looking particularly spectacular in his Spider-Man uniform, moves his arm around on a universal _let's go_ sign. Dan takes a deep breath—they haven't talked about what they should do if anything was to go wrong, and Dan's too used to things going sideways to really manage to distance himself from the concept that they're about to, but still all he's afforded is one second to inhale as deeply as he can before he's charging after the alien, every single one of his moves mirroring Phil's to precision.

Without looking away from the alien's huge green hands (which are now holding an equally huge contraption that Dan could only properly describe by calling it a _space gun_ ), Dan shoots for the ceiling and jumps, slinging with newfound poise to dodge the fluorescent laser the alien is shooting at him, with an ease that feels too unexpected for him to grasp lacing his every turn. 

He twists his body around so he can slice sideways through the air, keeping the alien busy while Phil approaches from the other side, fast enough that for a sharp, brilliant second, Dan's convinced they've got him. 

Except that Phil does an especially impressive somersault then, effectively positioning himself to land feet first on the alien with the most amount of strength possible. He lands–but the second his feet hit him he's disintegrating, body crumbling like the shifting of sand on a storm under Phil. 

The gun hits the ground with a loud clatter, and Dan pauses. Phil stands there, too, shocked still over a pile of green dust, and neither of them say anything until they do.

"Phil." Dan starts, carefully. "What just happened?" 

Phil looks down, moving his foot a little and watching with creased brows as the dust clings to his uniform. "I don't know. I thought–"

Dan feels the tingle start spreading through his body just as soon as Phil stops talking. His eyes narrow, and Dan hadn't expected Phil could look _dangerous_ but that's how he looks now, shooting a strand of webbing to Dan's chest and pulling him in too quick for Dan to stop him. He stumbles the way across the room to Phil, dragged in by the strength of his webbing. He touches it softly and Phil pulls him to his side by the hand, placing him just a millimeter behind him.

"It's a trap." Phil says, voice tight, and Dan can feel it too, the threat of it sending all of his senses into overdrive.

They stand there for a minute, ears straining, and nothing at all happens until _everything_ does. Whatever is after them now crashes into the room through one of the walls, sending debris and clouds of dust all around them. 

Dan feels as something moves closer, and he–he can't concentrate, not with the dusk and the mess surrounding them and the loud noise of a machine whirring away closer and closer to them and not with the feeling of Phil's hand brushing against his in what might as well be the last time ever. He takes a breath despite the dust and is pleased to find that the uniform filters the air enough that he doesn't choke.

He shuts his eyes, and suddenly he can see more than he could before: the threat coming from his left, the vibration of Phil's body preparing to move, the ground shaking under their feet. 

With his eyes closed, Dan dodges the first pulse of laser shot his way. He dances around each new strike as though his body is controlled by a force much larger than himself, leaping up and crouching down and sliding sideways to the beat of an unknown tune that crashes into his heart as though he's practiced in its every beat. 

Around him, he can feel as Phil does the same. Together, they dodge the laser pulses, escape the debris and maneuver with relative ease around the maze of falling concrete threatening to swallow them whole. Dan doesn't think they're winning, but he knows for a fact they're not _losing_ either, not just yet, even though it's a trap, even though whatever's shooting at them now knew their thoughts well enough to foresee Phil's logic. 

He shoots at the ceiling again, slinging into an arc and shifting just enough to evade being hit. In unspoken agreement, he goes up, and though he doesn't know _how_ he knows it, he knows Phil's going down, and is prepared to meet in the middle when Phil manages to duck his way around the lasers to approach the big machine charging at them. 

Dan lands on its back just as Phil comes up from the front, both of them circling whoever's shooting at them from the center.

Phil shoots out a web to grab the weapon and drag it away from the unseen bad guy, but he crouches to trip Dan and go for his throat just as Phil manages to get the gun. He throws it to the side, leaps forward to pull him away from Dan only to find that Dan has shoved him away himself, hands flying to the side of the guy's face, agile despite their inexperience. 

Phil binds the guy's feet together with a thick thread of webbing, pulling him in by the ankles. Dan shoots both of the guy's wrists and his face in quick succession, springing to his feet and running a hand down his face. 

"Holy fuck." Dan says, sounding out of breath and a little crazed. 

Phil nods, shoving the guy to the side so he's lying in front of them against the edge of the machine. Phil crouches down to his level, so Dan does too, watching as Phil rips the webbing covering the guy's mouth. 

Because, unbelievably enough, in front of them is a _guy_ , decidedly non-extraterrestrial, human both in the particular shape of his body and in the cunning light behind his eyes. 

Phil frowns as he looks at him, and Dan decides (maybe inadvisably) that he might as well watch Phil instead.

"Who are you?" Phil asks. Dan thinks back to the day they met, how different Phil's voice sounded as it talked to _him_ for the first time. He sounds serious now—threatening in a way that has Dan both slightly scared and weirdly warm. His profile looks appropriately menacing for his tone of voice, and Dan promises himself he'll remember this, too, the exact shape of Phil's cheekbones and nose and the curve of his lower lip as he snarls at someone who's just tried to kill them. 

Phil pushes forward to shove the guy around, pull him up by the lapels and down against the back of the leather seat they're standing behind. 

"I said," Phil repeats. "Who _the fuck_ are you?" 

The guy laughs in Phil's face, a bright sound that turns choked as Phil pushes him down further. It must hurt, because the guy's expression shifts into a grimace as Phil moves more heavily into his space.

Dan doesn't move a muscle except to tilt his head so he can pay better attention to whatever Phil's about to do.

"Couldn't put two and two together, could you, Philip?" The guy asks, smarmy despite the pain.

Phil grins at him, not looking any less scary. "Well, I figured out you're not an alien." 

"And it only took having me just about kill you, too." 

Phil shrugs. "You didn't, so I'd argue it's still in good time." 

"You would," the guy scoffs. "Always so _arrogant_ , Philip."

"Am I?" says Phil. "I'm not the one creating _interdimensional_ portals, you smarmy fuck." 

The guy laughs, and Dan kind of wants to punch him in the face. He doesn't know why Phil's not worried about the fact that this guy, whoever he is, clearly knows Phil's identity. He must know Dan's, too, and the pleasure he’s found in being unknown is something he might just do anything to keep.

"How do you know our names?" Dan inquiries, shuffling forward so he can stand beside Phil. 

He laughs again, and this time Dan does punch him, moving too fast for Phil to hold him back. He pulls his fist back in a daze, only slightly shocked at himself.

The guy spits out a mouthful of blood on the space next to him, not looking any less amused. "Daniel James Howell. Philip Michael Lester. I know your names because I know _all_ of your names. Every last one of you, with your _gifts_ and your arrogance. You think you can save the world? You can't. Not fast enough, not as fast as I can wreck them."

"I'm sorry to be the one to point this out," Phil starts, "but you're pretty tied up at the moment." 

"Funny." The guy drawls, and Dan’s starting to feel weird about this – he has no experience to speak of with bad guys of any sort (unless you count his myriad of high school bullies as bad guys, which he _might_ just feel inclined to), but he's pretty sure someone smart enough to create an _interdimensional portal_ wouldn't just hold on to any delusion.

"That's your plan, then?" Phil asks, shifting closer to him. "Wreck our realities, kill the both of us, double the full world domination?" 

"And you _still_ don't get it, do you?" He laughs. "There's no such thing as _the both_ of you. You're not the only Spider-Men in the multiverse, Philip. You'll be the first to die, but you're not the only ones." 

"Phil." Dan says, feeling the familiar tingle settle over his body. 

Phil doesn't look at him, instead narrowing his eyes at the guy and moving the tiniest bit closer. "Who are you?" 

Dan pulls Phil's hand, every hair in his body standing up in alarm. "Phil–"

"Who are you?" Phil repeats, but his voice has started to sound unsure.

The guy keeps smiling, and Dan keeps tugging on Phil's hand, trying to pull him back. 

Phil seems far away, almost, staring at the guy in a daze Dan can't seem to reach. "Who _are you?_ "

The guy laughs again, keeps laughing even as his skin melts away from him to reveal a black suit that makes Dan feel as though he's staring into a mirror. "I'm Spider-Man, Phil."

He disappears, and the room explodes. 

– 

Dan struggles under the weight of Phil's body as he tries to drag them away from the fire. All around him, the world is burning, but he doesn't stop walking, shoving concrete to the side, tears leaking down his face as fire tears his suit apart and licks at his exposed skin. He keeps moving – he's not letting Phil die here, no matter what. 

He keeps walking, and only stops when they're outside, far enough from the fire that he knows it won't reach them. He inhales, choking on the pain stabbing through him, more pain than he'd ever thought possible. 

He lays Phil down on the grass with every speck of gentleness he can muster, and promptly passes out. 

–

Phil's back is the first thing Dan sees when he opens his eyes. He blinks, once, twice, three times, until the image of him grows sharper, until Dan can focus on the shifting of his forearms where they're leaning against the windowsill.

It hurts too much to move, so he doesn't. He barely even breathes as he lays all his attention on Phil, on the quiet sound of his voice as he sings something to himself. He recognizes it immediately—the familiar instrumental carries through the air, traveling from Phil's lips to the tips of Dan's fingers, and Dan feels the pain leak out of him, leaving his body slumped back against the mattress. Each note curls around him easily until he’s calm, heart slowing its pace.

Tears springs to his eyes. His song exists in Phil's universe too. Phil knows it. Phil sings it when he's worried, just as Dan does, and Dan is falling in love with him. 

He's never been as sure of anything.

"Hi," Dan croaks, voice barely there at all. 

Phil turns, rushing to kneel by the side of the bed, so obviously misty-eyed that Dan wants to tell him. 

"You're awake." Phil says. "You're not dead." 

"I'm not dead." Dan smiles. It hurts – his lips must have gotten burnt too, he figures. 

Phil lifts his hand, runs his fingers softly over Dan's palm. "You saved my life."

"I did." Dan agrees. "But you saved mine too, so we're even." 

"The only reason I was able to bring you back here was you, Dan, you pretty much saved your own life." 

Dan turns his palm, catching Phil's fingers in it. He threads their hands together, intertwining their fingers. He squeezes. "That's not what I meant. You– just by coming here. To my– to my reality. It was enough."

"You could've _died_ because I came here." 

"But I didn't." Dan tells him. "That song you were singing just now–"

"Oh, it's– it's from a game."

Dan’s world tilts sideways for a second before snapping back into place. 

"Final Fantasy 7,” he smiles. “It's my favorite." 

"Is it?" Phil asks. 

Dan wants to remember this, too, how Phil sounds both in awe and like it's the least surprising thing he's ever heard. Dan wants to remember, every detail, the mold of his hand fitting so well in Dan's. Dan wants and wants and wants, and he wants to tell him, but somehow he doesn't. 

"What are we going to do?" Dan asks him. 

Phil's shoulders slump just slightly. "We'll think of something."

"Together?" says Dan, hands squeezing Phil's.

Phil looks at him, and Dan thinks he might not need to tell him at all. 

"Together."

**Author's Note:**

> if you enjoyed this and want to say hi or say literally anything at all i'm [unhawkeye](https://www.unhawkeye.tumblr.com) on tumblr and [whichjulia](https://www.twitter.com/whichjulia) on twitter. thanks for reading and have a lovely day!


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